Consumers Union Documents

The results of a year-long study among 56 hospital teams around the country recently revealed positive results. The Surgical Infection Prevention Collaborative aims to reduce deaths and injuries due to postoperative infections in the Medicare population, but the net effect is that everyone who goes to a hospital that institutes these practices will be safer. (pdf format only)

The Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services (CMS) is a little known entity with a lot of power: it oversees the operation of the Medicare and Medicaid programs and sets standards for most hospitals in the U.S.

Blog Posts

The Washington Post reported today on a new study suggesting premiums for Medicare prescription drug plans will rise by a whopping 87% next year. The report by Families USA, a national health consumer group, also says fewer states will have plans offering full coverage for most drugs needed by seniors.

Former FDA chief, Lester Crawford, who resigned after 2 months on the job, has plead guilty of charges of conflict of interest and lying about stock he and his wife owned in companies the FDA regulates.

News Articles

A recent study on mdical device recalls by the National Research Center for Women & Families found the majority of recalled medical products were approved without testing. The FDA’s 510(K) process that only requires medical devices be similar to another device on the market to be approved. Find the study in the Archives of Internal Medicine here.

A new study conducted from 2002 to 2007 in 10 North Carolina hospitals, found that harm to patients was common and that the number of incidents did not decrease over time. The most common problems were complications from procedures or drugs and hospital-acquired infections. Click here to view the study.

New report shows that hospital patients are being harmed by medical errors at an alarming rate. Unfortunately, most Americans have no way of knowing whether their hospital is doing a good job preventing medical errors.

Septicemia, also known as a blood infection, is a condition that gets high reimbursement amounts from Medicare. This report analyzes data from Prime Hospitals and shows high rates of septicemia compared with other hospitals-more than three times the national average.

Mandatory reporting of healthcare-acquired infections began in Pennsylvania nursing homes in June 2009 and this report is based on preliminary data from July-September 2009. The Authority is not yet releasing the data by facility.

Patient safety and healthcare-associated infections deserve “urgent attention,” according to the 2009 National Healthcare Quality Report. Published by the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, the report calls the country’s healthcare quality “suboptimal” and says “the gap between the best possible care and that which is routinely delivered remains substantial” across the country.

The Hearst Newspapers have created a color coded map of state reporting systems for medical errors. States collect a variety of data in different ways. The amount of information available to the public also differs from state to state.